Vee

Or they had the Barbara reveal in the chamber for Leslie all along. Which I think is far more likely.

Sooner or later they are casting Dante Green and he will likely be the show's first big bad. I can't wait tbh.

I don't think everything works, but I also haven't finished off the storyline so I don't want to judge - I do think there is a good point in not exploring it through randos we just met who everyone cottons onto and wants to help. Patricia Elliott (Renee) once said it should've been done using Asa/Renee and frankly the setup is there given how ugly their domestic situation has gotten in this period, but I don't think the audience would ever have forgiven Asa for battering Renee. Also, honestly I think some kind of episodic element is the only way forward for a streaming generation of new/old soaps - short-term arcs that tie into the larger, longer ongoing ones in a seasonal format, with filming breaks a la Port Charles ten years later. So I do think Gottlieb was ahead of her time, but I am not going to co-sign the Doug Ebert arc just yet.

I agree Vernon being Leslie's father would've been perfect if almost every man on the show wasn't a cheater lol. I would keep it to just Barbara.

Watching through October '91 continues to have some really interesting stuff - namely, playing the Joey/Stephanie angle however briefly which I suspected they might try. Chris McKenna is considerably, awkwardly younger than Robyn Griggs and Kevin calls attention to it just as others do his relationship with 'older woman' Lee Ann, but the brother conflict as well as Stephanie turning spoiled viper on Lee Ann in the Palace ladies' room makes me wonder again if they were considering at this point really making a go of it with Stephanie in some way. She did have heat with Jason, and Griggs is much more suited to the bitchy, spiky stuff tormenting Lee Ann. I would assume her long-rumored BTS behavior on daytime is what contributed to dumping her, but I'm not sure of when or why. Drunk Asa roaring through the teen social to shame working class Lee Ann is great, campy stuff, very of a piece with the show's roots - heavy-handed and operatic, sure, but it's about going back to the show having a class/caste system again after many years. Malone would revisit this kind of social shaming or public freakout again and again over the years, all the way to Jen Rappaport having a meltdown following her father's death in early 2003 at a Llanview U college party and raging at people. And generally it worked, except when they tried to reskin Jen as Marty for the 2000s. A great bit here with Renee who recognizes her own past in Lee Ann: "I'm not standing up for you. I'm standing up for me. I am you." I think @DRW50 has commented on the sly touch of Mia Korf's Blair arriving dressed like Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and playing up a submissive Asian stereotype for everyone. It's very smart. I missed the Banner city room and its staff interacting with Viki, Clint, Cassie, etc. long after it was gone - seeing at least a hint of the Banner offices in 2013, even confined to Viki's space where single mom Destiny was in the mailroom or whatever, thrilled me lol. Viki really has control of this staff BTW, which is cool to see after so long. Alex straight-up killing Fred Porter and a Canadian mountie(?) to cover her tracks in the Sarah conspiracy is a good reminder of how dangerous she was. They leaned into the more broad comedy later to keep her around and it generally worked out because she was still nuts and consistently aligned with bad people, but I wish we'd seen more of the truly dangerous Alex in her later years. You can't really see the Alex who got outplayed by Bo, Cutter, Kim, etc. here. Megan taking Erin Torpey's Jessica out for ice cream to spoil themselves so she can deal with the 'confirmation' of Sarah's death was great stuff, played lighter after her heartbreak in the right way - she just sort of gets on with it. Those bonds were so strong in these years, all throughout much of the '90s IMO. I especially loved Jessica Tuck's screwball stuff with McKenna and Joey Thrower a couple months prior to this, a bright spot in some very bad story with Kevin/Stephanie in the late summer. Wanda is so warm and loving with so much of the cast, including little Jess who she's known since Jessica was born. I've always loved Marilyn Chris but seeing her day to day again going through the latter half of '91 reminds me of how great she was. You would really need someone like Kathy Brier's Marcie or Roxy or whoever (or both!) to fill that role today. The infamous Doug and Jane Ebert domestic abuse vignette first appears at Wanda's on 10/15-16 (dates may be off on the videos), with the great, chameleonic Craig Wasson from Brian De Palma's Body Double and the very creepy film adaptation of Peter Straub's Ghost Story as Doug. I was always stunned to realize they got him for this, but his career was not exactly A-List. I do wonder what happened to him. So far I don't think the show is nearly as islanded to episodic story as people have always claimed it was in this period - yes, the abuse story, like Wanda's medical crisis and Sheila putting herself on the line for women's health in September, are short-term message arcs, but they are still vignettes playing alongside the larger, long-form storylines - Kevin and Lee Ann and the rising Buchanan family drama, Bo and Cassie haunted by Sarah with Alex on the rampage, Megan tempted by Heinrich/Cain (they make out a lot more than I expected) while Jake is imprisoned in Jaba and being tortured by dominatrix Ilsa(!), Luna's introduction, Blair's introduction, Jason's secrets (illiteracy) and Dorian being tempted by him, etc. Those stories IMO still follow classical daytime structure. And that's the kind of stuff you'd have to do today, I think - long-form story playing alongside or under the short-term arcs, and informing it or vice versa. Next up: Max feels like his old self again.

I do think people are right that Val Jean learned some of the wrong lessons from working at B&B. I thought that very early on this year and I think I talked about it then. And to a point, I get how it happened and why she's adopted a lot of that house style: B&B and the Bell soaps are a dependable workhorse with a very, very loyal audience that has served them well even as their quality went south. You can see the stylistic similarities to B&B or older Y&R (and the differences from her GH) quite easily, and the even earlier classical Bill Bell, Irna Phillips-style expository dialogue or family material. As I've said for months, BTG, even when it's not great, is a really fascinating mix of both very old school soap opera foundation work and fundamentals and very blunt and earnest social issue educational stuff as well as some very edgy or contemporary topics or dialogue (sometimes overripe or tryhard, sometimes good) a la the Prospect Park soaps. It's a bit like time travel in that way. I think it has a lot of good things and a lot of issues. I do think it needs to find a fresher and more consistent and coherent voice, and to mix stronger veteran dialogue staff with its existing ones. I think it needs to go back into the GH writers' corps MVJ came up with, and move away from the B&B house style. (And I think some stuff, particularly with Vanessa going full crime moll, has been pretty good and also pretty redolent of GH.) But I can't argue that that style does not have an audience, or that the heavy audience engagement and interest is not already there online. It's been serving them well both in numbers and on social media.

I think they clearly have Dante Green waiting in the wings.

A lovely clip. I will be watching a few vintage Scorpio eps this weekend in his honor. As a side note/distraction to today's sad news, we've had a lot of discussion in recent times re: Guza II, the downshifting of Sonny in those later years, his hyperfocus on Dante's ascension, etc. and how Dominic Zamprogna has been ill-treated since. I was curious if a few of us knew about this (sorry to @carolineg and @titan1978), as I stumbled on this very old anecdote while rummaging around in the GH hashtag entirely by accident: Very glad this didn't happen, but it does follow the classic arc of The Godfather Guza so adored and it fits his clear fixation on Dante.

That's from 2014, but it could easily serve as his last. A good scene.

I don't think they really have any choice. It's been awful for the show these last few years. But yes, it kind of reminds me of people claiming 1995 was too dark and depressing. Try this!

No, I totally get it and generally agree. Putting aside a few malcontents who are just here to hate, I do think there are a lot of great hopes pinned to this show and that people can get super-invested in it and therefore pretty passionate in their criticism. So I understand a lot of that because I have many of the same complaints (and then some). At the same time the reality is no soap is perfect out of the gate and BTG needs a lot of work, which is typical for almost any early daytime show. There's also a lot I enjoy and think is strong as much as I mock (and boy, there's enough to mock) while chugging along catching up on the show, and I feel there's overall good bones structurally. (I def don't think it's realistic or fair for anyone to demand the show's creator be run out on a rail in under six months though, lol.) And I am thrilled about the Barbara/Leslie twist. That kind of tie was essential for keeping her around and I felt the Articulettes saga had more to give.

I suspect it might have been twofold: They needed a nice sequence for Sasha's exit with one of her loved ones, and they likely knew Tristan might not have long and wanted to get him in once more. IIRC there was a lot of talk last year that Tristan and Emma Samms would return soon or often for Sasha, etc. after their exit, but that ending for Robert felt final and deliberate to me given his health in case that didn't happen, which I suspected it wouldn't. I am glad he got to have one more series of scenes.

I would be shocked if any of them didn't appear.

There will never be another like Scorpio. I always wanted the old man to lock in once more (Robert, not TR) and put together a cohesive plan of attack to dismantle Sonny's operation, The Wire-style. They had to neuter the character a bit to keep him viable in latter-day GH given that mob backdrop (now at its lowest ebb in a generation), they gave him a series of silly work positions or subplots, but Robert never lost the essence of who he was. Tristan wasn't ever capable of allowing that. I guess someone can always find Scorpio's master plan in a drawer one day soon. Maybe with the silly old WSB supercomputers and some shag carpeting. That is the Scorpio way.

As others have noted, I assume Kimberly McCullough's recent reminiscence of Robin on her social media is related to this as I assume she'd be back for any tribute. She's made many appearances since Robin and Patrick's exit in the mid-2010s but this will be her first in awhile; I just wish it was under happier circumstances.

Isaiah deserves a love interest who can act.

Very sad, but not surprising. A legend in his own time. Whatever my feelings about the storyline last year, GH clearly knew he likely didn't have long and gave him a HEA with Holly to tie the character up. You could tell. I'm glad they did it and that he also got a final scene not long ago with his new grandchild. To Frank Valentini's credit he often does very well with these memorials and treating the elder cast right before and after they pass, but it has been a very hard decade for GH. Let alone past five years. What Tristan gave to the show won't be surpassed. I hope Kimberly, etc. will appear.

It was Little Mo for me, but I assume she'll never be back.

Boy, do I not miss Lynne.

A feint. I get why they did it, it makes her seem like less of an existential threat than she will turn out to be.

I did not know Susan Fales-Hill, of A Different World fame, wrote on this and its finale. Yikes.

Tomas should've been canned before Day 1.

And still dressed like vintage Missy Elliott!

Impressive. Glad for them.

I've been rooting for Willow to steal Chase and bust up that Mormon marriage for ages (and then dump him from the show) so I'm all for it!